Monday, July 30, 2012

Picture Change

Bicycling has brought so many changes to my life. There is something about how it frees you from convention, if you let it, that propels you into new experiences. My shopping habits have changed (way less packaging because it is too hard to carry, more farmer's market purchases, more small store purchases because it is hard to park at the mall...), my eating habits are different (smaller amounts more often because it is awful to bike on a full stomach), my transportation choices have shifted (I will bike if I can, even when the car could be faster) and so much more.

My entry into photography was completely a result of riding my bicycle. When I started seeing pictures from around the world of people on bicycles, I wanted to start adding to the record of what was happening around me. As time went on, I wanted to do better at it and so I started to explore the camera. Even pictures of things that have nothing to do with bicycles still have a bicycle as part of them as I probably bicycled to get where I was shooting or the subject was found while riding around.

Bicycling is very hard on digital equipment. I have managed to destroy my Pentax 10D when I crashed my Bat on the Market St. train tracks. The smaller ones have either worn out or been dropped too many times. So now, I am using film cameras that are much smaller and a great deal more robust. But that means that my old "shoot-from-the-moving-saddle" style has got to change.

I can still do the occasional panda if I have the right camera with me,

but it is a great deal more difficult than it used to be.

So now, I will have to find a new style of shooting the bicycle scene. This means finding a different way to interact with it, too. It will take time to work out, but it will be fun and my bicycle will be with me all the way.

That happens. Next roll have them scan the shots to a disk or a something instead of printing them. That way you can get them into your computer and edit them yourself. You would be amazed at what you can salvage, especially with B&W.